An inquiry into the deaths of 87 patients, allegedly caused by the negligence of Dr ‘Death’ Jayant Patel—an Australian hospital’s director of surgery with Indian origins—was shut down on Friday after a court ruled the inquiry chief was biased.The $4.5 million inquiry in Queensland had four witnesses and 10 days left to run. Its interim report in May said that Dr Patel, linked to 87 deaths at the Bundaberg Hospital in northern Queensland in 2003-04, should face murder, negligence and fraud charges.The inquiry’s closure shocked the doctor’s former patients and staff. Patel, a US citizen, left Australia for the United States in March after being linked to the deaths.Queensland Supreme Court ruled that inquiry head Tony Morris and his two deputies be disqualified due to “ostensible bias, forcing the inquiry’s closure.Judge Martin Moynihan said that Bundaberg Hospital’s suspended district manager, Peter Leck, and suspended director of medical services, Dr Darren Keating, had proved their case that Morris displayed bias against them. —Reuters
